For a long time it has been universally agreed upon that people should engage in end-of-life planning, at least until right-wing pundits made end-of-life planning an easy but incidental target of their battle against health care reform. Xanthippas at Three Wise Men takes aim at these critics, and the very real harm they do to people with their dishonest and partisan attacks.

Neil at Texas Liberal is back from a two-week vacation that took him to Chicago, Kenosha, Wisconsin, Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Dayton, Ohio and Northern Kentucky. This itinerary is consistent with a post Neil made earlier this summer encouraging folks to visit the industrial midwest. With vacation over, it’s time now to think of school and swine flu. It sure would help if more working people had paid sick days to help manage getting sick themselves and having kids sick at home.